Fixing our country's health care system is a pressing issue for every American, but it's of critical importance to communities of color. 

The Health and Human Services Offices of Health Reform recently released the following findings that underscore the inequities of a health care system where low-wage workers and racial and ethnic minorities have higher rates of disease and too often face insurmountable barriers to care:

- 48 percent of African-American adults suffer from a chronic disease compared to 39 percent of the population at large.

- African-Americans are more likely to develop and die from cancer than any other racial and ethnic group.

- Hispanic and Vietnamese women have disproportionate rates of cervical cancer, at twice the rate of white women. 

- Nearly 50 percent of Hispanics and more than 25 percent of African-Americans do not have a regular doctor, compared to 20 percent of whites.

(Source: HHS Offices of Health Reform)

Perhaps most shocking: For the first time in our nation's history, our next generation may live sicker, shorter lives than their parents. Our collective ability to address these troubling racial and ethnic disparities begins with Congress passing comprehensive healthcare legislation - now.

National health care reform must address healthcare disparities from several angles.  

First, health care reform needs to improve access by offering working women and men of every race and ethnicity affordable, high-quality public and private health insurance options. Reform will be meaningless if working people can't afford to purchase coverage or can't afford to get the care they need once they are covered. Second, reform needs to prioritize primary and preventive care to tackle the chronic diseases that are crippling so many of our communities. And finally, we need to recruit and grow a diverse and robust healthcare workforce filled with nurses, doctors and health care workers that reflect the diversity of their patients.

This summer, thousands of Americans with The Healthcare Equality Project, a coalition of equality and social justice groups and working women and men from all walks of life, are calling on Congress to pass health care reform legislation that provides high quality, affordable coverage and a health care system that truly works for everyone.

Activists, health care providers and citizens from states around the country are building a national drumbeat. Last month, more than 2,000 men, women, and children - all with their own health care story of how we need to end healthcare disparities - converged on Washington D.C. for a candlelight vigil. The night symbolized the power behind the health care equality movement, and gave new energy to our call that Congress act quickly to fix a broken system that costs too much, covers too few, and leaves communities of color behind. 

The harsh reality in every city and town across America is that families have reached the breaking point in this economic crisis.  Americans are choosing between paying for groceries and paying for life-saving prescriptions. We cannot solve our economic crisis unless we fix our health care system.  Health care costs are too high to bear - for families, for small business, for state government. Some may say health care reform has to wait, that there are other issues that are more important, but nothing is more important than making sure that every family has the right to a healthy future and getting our economy back on track.

We need everyone's voice to pass health care reform now that will lower overall health care costs and increase access to comprehensive health care that can make a difference in the quality of our lives and our children's lives. More than one million doctors, nurses and health care workers of the .....

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